Life

Fast Times at Ironman Austria!

Viktor Zyemtsev and Kate Allen each returned to Klagenfurt and powered to fast wins at the 2003 Ironman Austria Triathlon Sunday.

Kate Allen and Viktor Zyemtsev won Ironman Austria in truly world class style, each posting times that would rank them with some of the world’s best Ironman triathletes.

Allen’s performance was truly outstanding. In just her third Ironman competition, the Australian-turned-Austrian posted an impressive 8:54:01 in winning.

Allen arrived in Klagenfurt as the prohibitive favorite, and seemed to have a whole country’s worth of expectations riding on her shoulders as she started the swim. She didn’t even notice, she says, because she expected so much from herself.

"I’d never won a major race until today," she said after her huge win. "I focused all year on what I wanted, which was to win. I didn’t feel the pressure from other people because I put so much pressure on myself."

And win she did.

After trailing three-time Ironman Austria champion Wendy Ingraham out of the water by just over a minute, Allen quickly caught up to the 39-year-old American during the early stages of the bike.

"I didn’t know how fast I should go," Allen said, "So I focused on Wendy."

The two waged an interesting battle through the three loop bike course – Allen would get ahead on the first part of the loop that included the climb up to the famous Rupertiberg hill, while Ingraham would regain the lead on the long descent.

On the final lap, though, Ingraham couldn’t catch up to Allen.

"I was doing 68k-an-hour," Ingraham said, "And I still couldn’t get her.

Once they got running, the rivalry was quickly ended. Allen took off like a shot, and never looked back.

"Normally my run is like a roller coaster (up and down)," Allen said, "But today my run was consistent."

Consistent is an understatement. Allen’s 2:57 marathon puts her in some pretty exclusive sub-3 hour company!

After her incredible race here, one might think Allen would be gearing up to improve on her seventh place finish in Kona last year, but in fact, she’s hoping she won’t be starting the World Championship.

She wants to represent Austria at the Olympic Games next year, and to do that, she must qualify for the World Short Course Championships in New Zealand. If she qualifies for that worlds, she won’t be at "our" World Championship.

While Allen was running away with the women’s race, Italy’s Edith Niederfriniger was running her way to an impressive second place finish. Ingraham would hang on for third.

As a lieutenant in the Ukranian Army, Viktor Zyemtsev is, in theory, in charge of a group of men. In practice, he spends most of his time training. He competes at a lot of short course military events, but manages to sneak off to do Ironman Austria every July.

Well "sneak" isn’t exactly the best way to put it. It’s a miracle Zyemtsev even got to the starting line. Over the past two weeks he:

1) Competed at the European Championships (got 22nd place)

2) Got his bike stolen at said championship

3) Got robbed on the way home from said championship while trying to fix a flat tire

4) Couldn’t get a visa to come to Austria until three days before the race

5) Finally got off a bus in Klagenfurt at 2AM on Saturday morning.

Oh, the fun continues. He had to borrow a bike in order to compete, and managed to get some race clothes and a wetsuit donated by some of the race sponsors.

The bike almost worked, although his back was so sore riding it he was 10 minutes slower than last year.

The fact that Olaf Sabatschus was tearing up the race course, riding a 4:17 super-split didn’t help Zyemtsev’s situation, either.

Especially since Italy’s Gianpietro De Faveri had ripped up the swim course with a blazing 44:44 swim split!

De Faveri would fade on the bike, and Sabatschus is trying to get over an Achilles tendon injury, so he couldn’t run. The man who chased the German through the bike course, Switzerland’s Bruno Von Flue, could, though.

Von Flue used the second fastest bike split to get himself out on the run course well ahead of Zyemtsev, and ran a solid 2:56 marathon.

A ten-minute lead, and a 2:56 marathon split, doesn’t keep you ahead of a whirlwind who runs a 2:41 marathon, though. Zyemtsev flew through the marathon course, took the lead by 30 km, and got to enjoy the last 12km of spectator-filled running as he repeated as the men’s champion here.

Von Flue was fortunate that Tibor Lehmann ran out of real estate in finishing third. Lehmann, a 14-time Hungarian champion, came back to Austria after a couple of years away.

"I’m older now, I have a job … it’s just for fun," he said of his participation in the sport.

Whew … you’d hate to see how fast he’d go if he got serious!

Going fast is what it’s all about here at Ironman Austria. A fast course and perfect conditions coincided for a very quick day of racing. With almost 1,700 starters today, Ironman Austria has seen its field increase by a factor of 10 in just five years.

If there are many more days like this one, it will become even more popular!

For complete race coverage and results, click on the banner at the top of the home page.

You may contact Kevin Mackinnon at Originally posted to ironmanlive.com on 07/7/2003 08:00am by Kevin Mackinnon.